the Russians hire Simonides to prepare historical documents after the 1867 fake obituary

If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

the Russians hire Simonides to prepare historical documents after the 1867 fake obituary

the Russians hire Simonides to prepare historical documents after the 1867 fake obituary in Alexandria

("reports of his death were greatly exaggerated")

This is referenced en passant by Tregelles in 1869, in:

Notes and Queries (1869)
Codex Mayerianus and Simonideshttp://books.google.com/books?id=nWoJAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA389And picked up, again en passant, by Scrivener in the 1875 Six Lectures.The announcement of the death of Simonides in “ N. & Q.” was supposed to set all questions about him, in one sense, at rest; but only a few months had passed when he turned up in Russia, where the Rev. Donald Owen found him preparing for publication “Historical Documents of Great Importance in Connection with Claims of the Russian Government.”

"Those of us who had pressed him the hardest were rather shocked to learn in 1867 that Constantine Simonides had just perished at Alexandria of the cruel disease of leprosy:—he had- died and given no sign! Proportionably great was our relief about two years after to be told on the authority of the Rev. Donald Owens of St Petersburg that he had turned up again under a feigned name in that capital ..."

Now, the last country and city you would expect, per the traditional understanding, to welcome Simonides in the late 1860s would be St. Petersburg, Russia. Unless, as conjectured by a Russian writer in 2008, Tischendorf and Simonides has an .. arrangement. Tischendorf was beginning to gather $ and laurels by the late 1860s, and his reputation was bolstered by the 1869 arm-twising agreement with St. Catherine's Monastery in Sinai.

Was it now time for Simonides to receive a payoff and go into quiet mode?

And preparing .. historical documents? Avraam Norov (1795-1869), close friend of Tischendorf, who had first answered the heresy accusations of Uspensky on Sinaiticus, had even been Minister of Public Information in Russia in the 1850s. Everybody knew the Simonides reputation was not exactly that of a stellar, reliable historian. Nor was he known for special Russian linguistic skills, although his travels had taken him to Odessa and Moscow in earlier years. (Correction: his Russian was likely quite strong.)

So how in the world would Simonides get a position, in Russia (!), in St. Petersburg, preparing historical documents? After being, supposedly, the false accuser of the great Tischendorf.

hmmmmmm..

================================
At the risk of saying the perplexing:

And remember, the Russians have found a number of historical documents about the Sinai loan and agreement in their archives. If their historical documentarian with superb Greek skills in that period was Constantine Simonides, their authenticity is clearly not to be assumed without double and triple verification.

Aretemidorus and later years - Medvedev and Canfora

Rukopisnoe nasledie russkich vizantinistov v archivach Sankt-Peterburg
Medvedev, Igor
Saint-Petersburg. Bulanin. 1999. 630 S. : Ill..
ISBN 5-86007-146-9
This large book is not in American or English libraries, it was suggested that Canfora translates a lot of the important info into Italian. The Libraries listed included Netherlands, France, Germany, presumably Russia as well.

Medvedev translates a long autobiography of Simonides (is it Charles Stewart? Dunno.)

This might have more about Simonides in Russia. Simonides material from Medvedev translated in Canfora. The question is whether this is new material or simply a rehash of the Stewart biography and the book list that is in a Simonides publication of 1864, Periplus of Hannon. ... Pasquale Pinto references Canfora bibliographies of 2008 and 2010. He also gives references for Simonides in Alexandria in his later years. If Medvedev has a Simonides biography, and list of books, translated in Italian by Canfora, the big question is whether this is new material from archives in Russia, or simply the Periplus and Stewart material crossing languages.
Canfora, Luciano (2012), Constantinos Simonides: Opere greche I, Bari.
The autobiography, maybe much more, is translated from Russian to Italian.

( Federico Condello also has an Italian paper.)

Lilia Diamantopoulou has a paper coming out shortly on Simonides, written in German. This will include a chronology and study of the Symais, the History of Kefallonia and the Painters manual.